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Monday, January 28, 2013

Another Day, Another Case Of Catholic Hypocrisy

Jeremy Stodghill, at the grave of his wife and sons

I sometimes think if you look up the word 'hypocrisy' in the
dictionary, it will say, see: Catholic Church. I mean, we always hear the
Pope and his minions talk about working for the poor while they sit on golden
thrones in palaces and order Prada loafers by the crate. We hear them talk
about protecting children, and then read about how they really protect pedophiles.
They say they care for the sick, but don't believe in condoms as an HIV
preventative.

Hypocrisy. But the Church took another
giant leap in hypocrisy recently in the case ofLori Stodghill.

See, back in January 2006, Lori Stodghill
was seven-months pregnant with twin boys and not feeling so good. She went to
St. Thomas More hospital in Cañon City, Colorado, and was vomiting and short of
breath; she passed out as she was being wheeled into an examination room. Medical staff did try and resuscitate her
but, they later found out, a main artery feeding her lungs was clogged, and that caused Lori Stodghill to suffer a massive heart attack. Lori’s obstetrician, Dr. Pelham
Staples, who happened to be the emergency on-call obstetrician that
night, never answered a page and Lori Stodghill died at the hospital less than
an hour after she arrived.

Her sons died in her womb.

Lori Stodghill’s husband Jeremy filed a wrongful-death
lawsuit on behalf of himself and his now mother-less two-year-old daughter
Elizabeth. His lawyers argued that Dr. Staples should have made it to the hospital
that night or, at the very least, instructed emergency room staff to
perform a Caesarean-section to save Lori's sons.

The
lead defendant in the case is Catholic Health Initiatives, a nonprofit that
runs St. Thomas More Hospital, along with 170 other health facilities. Catholic Health Initiatives’ mission is to “nurture the healing
ministry of the Church” and to be guided by “fidelity to the Gospel.”

In that
regard, Catholic Health facilities says it follows the Ethical and Religious
Directives of the Catholic Church. In
fact, its directive plainly states: “Catholic health care ministry witnesses to
the sanctity of life ‘from the moment of conception until death. The Church’s
defense of life encompasses the unborn.”

So, where's the hypocrisy? Is it that the hospital chose
not to do a C-section to save Lori Stodghill's sons?

Not really, See, when it came to mounting a defense in the
Stodghill case, Catholic Health Initiatives' lawyers have basically disavowed the
Church directives by arguing state law protects doctors from
liability concerning unborn fetuses on grounds that those fetuses are not
persons with legal rights.

Yes, the Catholic Health Initiatives, which bases its
whole mission on the precepts of the Catholic Church, is claiming
that the fetuses were not people;

at least in the case of a lawsuit regarding the death of a woman and her unborn children.

I guess fetuses are people when women seek abortions, but
fetuses aren't people if they're deaths will cost the Catholic Church any kind
of monetary payout in a lawsuit. And, you can argue that this isn’t the
Catholic Church, but, let's be clear, Catholic health initiatives bases its entire operation on the teachings
and the principles of Catholicism. Unless it costs them money from the Pope’s
shoe budget.